1851. 



THE GENESEE FARMER. 



11 



mildew, called by botanists pnccinia, and rust, called 

 vrcdo, of which smut is a variety. Mildew was very 

 destructive to the wheat crop of England in 1804, 

 when this parasite was critically studied by Sir 

 Joseph Banks, who made microscopical drawing's of 

 the same, which are preserved in the British Museum. 

 Since then, this class of plants has commanded con- 

 siderable attention in all civilized nations. 



-T^== Fig. 4 repre- 

 ~3' sents the com- 

 mon appear- 

 ance of niil- 

 FiG. 4. dew, the straw 



is a little magnified. Its appearance under a first 

 rate modern microscope is shown in Fig. 5, where 

 the dusty patches are crowds of club-shaped fungi 

 (spores.) 



IfK/^ 



Fig. 5. 

 The thicker end of each is divided into two cham- 

 bers that contain the reproductive spontles. These 

 lift up the epidermis, (skin,) which is ruptured, and 

 millions of seeds are scattered far and wide by the 

 air and wind. Whether they pass with atmosphei'ic 

 air through the pores {stomata) in the leaves of 

 wheat plants, or though the apertures in their roots, 

 or both, botanists are not agreed. That the spores 

 of fungi exist in the fluids or sap of cereal plants, 

 has been demonstrated ; but how they got there is 

 not well settled. They often grow on the moist cov- 

 ering of the stems of grain and grass. There is a 

 fungus that attacks only the joints of vvheat, called 

 diapaza, and still another of the mildew tribe, of a 

 black color, which is said never to attack wheat till 

 it is previously diseased. This, as well as iirfido 

 rubigo, and ^iredo feiida, (red rust and smut,) will be 

 described and illustrated in our next. 



PROPER TIME FOR FELLING TIIVIBER. 



Mr. William Painter, of Concordville, Pa., in a let- 

 ter written for the Patent Office Report, says : "Du- 

 ring an experience of more than forty years as a 

 plain practical farmer, I have taken much interest in 

 ascertaining the best season for felling timber ; and 

 I now state, with much confidence, that fencing tim- 

 ber, such as all kinds of oak, chestnut, red hickory, 

 and walnut, cut from the middle of July to the last of 

 August, will last more than twice as long as when 

 cut in winter, or common barking time in spring. 

 For instance, cut a sapling, say five or six inches in 

 diameter, for a lever, in the month of August, and 

 another of a similar size and quality, in winter or 

 spring, and I knoiv that if the first is stripp^jd of its 

 bark (which at that time runs well) it will raise as a 



lever, at least twice the weight that can be raised by 

 the latter."' 



Statements like the above, made by reputable 

 men who can have no motive to misrepresent facts, 

 are always entitled to a respectful consideration. 

 Why should a green " sapling, six inches in diameter, 

 cut in August," be any stronger after it is well sea- 

 soned, than it would be if cut in wiuter or spring 1 



While we doubt the fact ol the difference being so 

 great as Mr. Painter thinks that he has good reason 

 to believe it to be, we do not question that there is 

 some difference. The woody fibres of the tree are 

 the same in August and in winter and sprin^' • the 

 new layer of wood, alburnum, is thin and compara 

 tively small, and most of this is deposited before 

 August. The proportion of sap or water in a green 

 tree, varies but little in dilTerent seasons of the year, 

 as compared with its dry matter. What, then, is the 

 exact difl'erence in timber in autumn and in spring, 

 after a tree has put forth its leaves, and its terminal 

 branches are rapidly extending by the deposition of 

 new wood ? When is the matter organized which 

 flows as sugar dissolved in water, from the sugar- 

 tree in the spring, before even the buds begin to 

 swell ? In what condition, and in what place does 

 this saccharine substance spend the time from au- 

 tumn till March ? Mulder, in his valuable work on 

 the "Chemistry of Vegetable and Animal Physi- 

 ology," says that all sugar is first formed into starch 

 from carbon and water ; and that it is from this 

 starch that both sugar and new wood, in spring, are 

 produced. We are aware that other chemists have 

 taken a different view of this subject, but we believe 

 that Mulder is right. We know that fat in ani- 

 mals is a sort of storehouse of fuel which the animal 

 can burn when its food is lacking or deficient to 

 maintain vital warmth. Potatoes, and many other 

 plants possess unequal quantities of starch at differ- 

 ent periods and under different circumstances. A 

 greeu sapling in the spring, has all its starch and 

 albumen, or the raw material for making a vast num- 

 ber of leaves, much nov/ wood, and its tissues, in 

 which nitrogen is consumed, taken out of its trunk 

 and distributed in thousands of branches, and in ter- 

 minal buds. That the trunk should be a little weaker 

 when thus deprived of all of its soluble solids, is no 

 more than we might reasonably expect. To trans- 

 form starch, which is insoluble, into soluble dextrine, 

 sugar or gum, is the effect of the first warmth of 

 spring, or winter, for in many States maple sugar is 

 made in January and February. 



If the' above view of this interesting question is 

 founded on true phisiological principles, as we believe 

 it is, then the best time to fell a tree is after it has 

 ceased to grow in autumn, and prepared, like a fat 

 bear in the fall, a good supply of starch and of nitro- 

 genous compounds, in all its sap-tissues, for use 

 when it is ready to put forth a new covering of lux- 

 uriant foliage. There is strength in the elements of 

 forest leaves, and these elements while deposited in 

 the cells of sap wood, if dried therein, increase its 

 durability. Dry rot is a fungus which destroys a 

 great deal of ship and other timber. Whatever ope- 

 rates to exclude atmospheric air, tends to prevent this 

 malady. Several minerals, like copperas, corrosive 

 sublimate and blue vitriol, will kill the fungus called 

 "dry-rot." Exclude oxygen from wood and it can- 

 not decay. Painting preserves it on this principle. 



A HAND, in measuring height of horses, is four inches. 



